Background to Forced Cultivation: Objectives, Rules, Basic Provisions and Their Impacts

Background to Forced Cultivation: Purpose, Rules, Basic Provisions and Impacts – On this occasion About the knowledge.co.id will discuss the background of forced planting and of course about other things that also cover it. Let's look at the discussion together in the article below to better understand it.

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Background to Forced Cultivation: Objectives, Rules, Basic Provisions and Their Impacts

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Forced cultivation or often known as cultuurstelsel is one of the Dutch colonial policies that had a huge impact on the Indonesian nation.

Forced Cultivation is a regulation issued by Governor General Johannes Van den Bosch in 1830 which requires that each village set aside a portion of their land (20%) for planting export commodities, especially coffee, sugarcane, and tarum (tilapia). These crops would be sold to the colonial government at a fixed price and the crops would be handed over to the colonial government.

Villagers who do not own land have to work 75 days a year (20%) on government-owned gardens which are a kind of tax. In practice, this regulation was meaningless because it was mandatory for all agricultural areas to be planted with exportable crops and the yields were handed over to the Dutch government.

Areas used for cultuurstelstel practices are still subject to tax. Residents who do not own agricultural land are required to work for a full year on agricultural land.

Forced cultivation was the most exploitative era in the economic practices of the Dutch East Indies. This system of forced cultivation was much tougher and crueler than the VOC monopoly system because there was a target of generating state revenue that the government really needed.

Farmers who during the VOC era had to sell certain commodities to the VOC, now have to grow certain crops and sell them at prices set to the government. It was this forced cultivation asset that contributed greatly to capital during the golden age of the Dutch East Indies liberal colonialists in 1835 to 1940.

Forced cultivation was a policy that forced the population of the Dutch East Indies to plant export commodity crops. These plants must then be sold to the Netherlands at a certain price, not to other parties.

Villagers who did not own land had to work in gardens owned by the Dutch government or other landlords. These people are treated like cheap laborers with bad working conditions.

With the high production of these export commodities, the Dutch government hopes to sell them on the European market at high prices.

This program aims to generate money for the Dutch state in order to support colonialism in the Dutch East Indies and the prosperity of its people. With this large amount of money, the Dutch government was able to pay its debts, build infrastructure and expand its colonial empire.

Forced Cultivation (cultuurstelsel) is a system or regulation implemented by the Dutch Colonial government to the population to plant crops certain species that are highly salable in the international market and whose crop products must be handed over to the Dutch colonial government through intermediary authorities local.

During this forced cultivation system, residents were obliged to plant various crops including sugarcane, coffee, tea, and tilapia because these plants have a very high selling value, especially in the market Europe. Apart from that, this system also regulates the land tax system which must be paid in the form of local residents' crops.

This system is a combination of the VOC system implemented in West Java, with the land tax system. This system was the result of a policy issued by Van den Bosch who at that time served as the Governor General of the Dutch East Indies.

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Background to the Implementation of the Forced Cultivation System

The Dutch war with Prince Diponegoro was one of the causes of the Forced Cultivation policy. In general, the background for the implementation of forced cultivation by the Dutch in Indonesia was because the country needed money to pay off debts in order to avoid bankruptcy. The very high Dutch debt is caused by several things, including:

• In Europe, the Netherlands was involved in wars during the heyday of Napoleon, which cost a lot of money.
• The Belgian war of independence ended with the separation of Belgium from the Netherlands in 1830.
• The occurrence of the Diponegoro war (1825 to 1830) which was the most expensive colonial people's resistance for the Netherlands. The Diponegoro War cost ± 20,000,000 guilders.
• The Dutch state treasury is empty and the debt borne by the Netherlands is enormous.
• Income from growing coffee is not much.
• Cessation of production of export crops during the land lease system.
• Failure after practicing the liberal ideas of 1816 to 1830 in exploiting the colonies to give the colonies a huge advantage over the mother country.
• There were many rebellions by Indonesian independence fighters in various parts of the archipelago
• Trading practices and monopoly on spices and coffee in the archipelago did not generate enough money for the Dutch
• Where the atmosphere of government between 1816-1830 in Java failed to generate many profits and coffers for the parent country.
• Where Dutch trade and shipping through the N.H.M (Nederlansche Hwendels Maatschappij) company which was founded in 1824 experienced a setback. The company handles trading, shipbuilding and lending to other parties with a view to rebuilding the economy of the Netherlands.

These factors played a major role in destroying the Dutch economy. The country that initially controlled Asian trade, became one of the European trading centers, and has a very stable economic system is in huge debt.

At that time, the Dutch treasury was not enough to maintain its colonies in Indonesia and the Caribbean region which was very scattered. In addition, the country was also unable to set aside funds for rebuilding after the war.

This lack of cash was caused by the Belgian revolution where they wanted independence from the Netherlands. The Belgian rebels supported by the French army succeeded in defeating the Netherlands and being recognized as an independent country by European countries. Finally, the Netherlands admitted defeat and also ratified Belgian independence through the London agreement.

In addition, the Netherlands also struggled a lot in its colonies against rebels. Especially, the rebellion initiated by Prince Diponegoro.

This country had to spend a lot of money to pay mercenaries, hire local troops, and pay local kings to reduce rebellion.

The Dutch colonial empire, which was supposed to generate a lot of money, according to the motto gold, glory, gospel, actually spent a lot of money. In fact, Indonesia is very rich in natural resources, both biological and non-biological.

Therefore, a source of income is needed that can quickly generate money and provide income for the Dutch state.

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Main Provisions of the Forced Cultivation System

The main provisions of the forced cultivation system in Indonesia are regulated in the Dutch State Gazette (Staatsblad) No. 22 of 1834. The regulation reads:

• Residents are required to plant a fifth of their land with plants required by the government.
• The land is exempt from demands for land tax.
• The land will be worked for one fifth of the year (66 days a year)
• All investment risks are borne by the government.
• The products from these obligatory plants must be transported to the factory themselves and receive compensation from the government.
• Excess of the required yield will be fully reimbursed by the government.
• The time of planting this obligatory crop should not be longer than the work of planting rice.
• Those who do not own land will be obliged to work on government-owned plantations for more than 60 days.

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Purpose of Formation of Forced Cultivation System

In general, the main purpose of the implementation of the forced cultivation system by the Dutch in Indonesia was to replenish the Dutch state treasury. In detail, the following are some of the objectives of establishing this forced cultivation system in Indonesia:

• Filling the empty Dutch state treasury
• Rebuilding infrastructure in the Netherlands that was destroyed by war
• Raised funds to strengthen the army and colonial administration in the Dutch East Indies and the Caribbean
• Paying the debts that belonged to the Dutch because they had to fight the rebellion of the Indonesian independence fighters

We can draw the conclusion that at that time, the Netherlands was on the verge of bankruptcy because it was hit by a lot of successive misfortunes. To avoid bankruptcy, this country forces Indonesia as one of its colonies to work hard to pay off its debts.

This was done by forcing the Indonesian people to plant spices and other export commodities. Then, this commodity will be controlled by the Dutch with a monopoly scheme, so that only they can buy and resell it on the European market.

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The Cultivation Rules

The basic rules of forced cultivation are contained in the 1834 Staatblad (State Gazette). 22 which was legalized a few years after the forced cultivation was carried out. There are several rules in the sheet which include:

Agreements will be concluded with residents to provide them with a portion of their land for growing export crops that can be sold on the European market.
Agricultural land provided by residents, may not exceed one-fifth of the agricultural land owned by villagers.
The work required to grow these crops should not exceed the work required to grow rice.
The land provided by the residents is free from land tax.
The results of these plants were submitted to the Dutch East Indies government; If the price is estimated to exceed the land tax that must be paid by the people, then the excess is given to the residents.
Crop failures that are not due to farmers' fault will be the responsibility of the government
For those who do not own land, will be employed in plantations or factories owned by the government for 65 days every year.

In general, if we pay attention, these regulations do not seem too burdensome and detrimental for the people of the Dutch East Indies.

We can see that the land provided is no more than one-fifth of the village's land. This means that farmers can still cultivate crops as normal because only 1/5 of their land is used for forced cultivation.

In addition, crop failures will also be borne by the government thereby reducing the burden on farmers. Residents who do not own land will also be employed in Dutch plantations, thus creating employment opportunities for those who are currently unemployed.

Land allocated to Cultuurstelsel is also exempt from land tax. Thus, reducing the burden that needs to be borne by farmers. However, the reality of the application of forced cultivation in Indonesia at that time was not as beautiful as these regulations.

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Impact of the Cultivation System

The following are two (2) impacts of the forced cultivation system, including:

• For the Netherlands

For the Netherlands includes several impacts, as follows:

• • Increased export crop yields from colonial countries and sold by the Dutch on the market in Europe.
  • The Dutch shipping companies, which initially grew and fell after the forced planting, made bigger profits.
  • The sugar factory which was originally provided by the Chinese private sector was then also developed by the Dutch.
  • The Netherlands gets a big profit from the slot. The first forced cultivation profit in 1834 amounted to 3 million guilders, in the following year it was around 12 million to 18 million guilders.

• For Indonesia

For Indonesia there are impacts, as follows:

• • Negative impact
    • Prolonged poverty and physical and mental suffering.
    • Agriculture, especially rice, experienced many crop failures.
    • Famine and death occurred everywhere as happened in Cirebon 1834 as a result of harvesting
    • added tax in the form of rice. In Demak (1884) and in Grobogan (1849 to 1850) as a result
    • crop failure.
    • Indonesia's population is declining.
    • Heavy tax burden.
  • Positive impact
    • Indonesian people know the technique of planting new types of plants.
    • The Indonesian people are getting to know export-oriented trade crops.

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